How to ask how to refer to gay parents
Dear Justice Kennedy: An Open Letter from the Child of a Loving Queer Parent
Dear Justice Kennedy,
June is nigh, and with it will come your verdict on the most contentious political issue of our time: marriage.
I write because I am one of many children with gay parents who believe we should protect marriage. I believe you were right when, during the Proposition 8 deliberations, you said “the voice of those children [of same-sex parents] is important.” I’d like to define why I ponder redefining marriage would actually serve to strip these children of their most fundamental rights.
It’s very difficult to converse about this subject, because I adore my mom. Most of us children with gay parents do. We also love their partner(s). You don’t perceive much from us because, as far as the media are concerned, it’s impossible that we could both admire our gay parent(s) and oppose lgbtq+ marriage. Many are of the opinion I should not endure . But I perform, and I’m not the only one.
This debate, at its core, is about one thing.
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The definition of marriage should have nothing
What’s in a name? Plenty, if you’re a woman-loving woman or gay parent, says grad-student sociologist
Visiting a park with their kids, it’s not uncommon for dyke mothers to be asked by a stranger: “Which one of you is the real mom?” On a family outing, one gay dad is often taken to be the biological father, the other to be “just” a friend (or cousin, or uncle) tagging along.
Rafael Colonna studies how gay and lesbian parents create a sense of family.
How, then, do same-sex parents construct it known that they are co-equal parents, ease strangers’ dis-ease, fend off excessive scrutiny or underline their family’s legitimacy?
Rafael Colonna, a Berkeley Ph.D. candidate interested in gender, sexuality and the sociology of the family, has been interviewing same-sex parents to answer such questions. In the process, he’s discovered that in family experience, “small practices can own a lot of sense behind them.”
The assigning of familial names and titles is one of the “small” arenas where gay parents attempt to navigate a “hetero-normative” world, he says. Some couples build a shared last mention for themselves and for the
Gay Parents As Wonderful As Straight Ones
MED prof’s finding comes as Supreme Court weighs same-sex marriage
When the Supreme Court took up the issue of queer marriage last month, Justice Antonin Scalia claimed that experts debate whether gay parents are horrible for children.
“There’s considerable disagreement among sociologists as to what the consequences are of raising a child in a…single-sex family, whether that is harmful to the child or not,” Scalia declared.
Benjamin Siegel says Scalia’s contention is—not to get too technical—baloney.
Siegel, a School of Medicine professor of pediatrics, coauthored a report, published by the American Academy of Pediatrics the week before the court case, arguing that three decades of research concur that kids of gay parents are doing just fine.
“Many studies have demonstrated that children’s well-being is affected much more by their relationships with their parents, their parents’ sense of competence and security, and the presence of social and economic support for the family than by the gender or the sexual orientation of their parents,” Siegel writes with coauthor Ellen Perrin, a Tufts University professor of pediatrics and director of de
One of the things that initially got me eager about starting this blog was the fact that no one seems to agree on some of the simplest gay parenting questions. For example: “what do babies call their gay dads?”
Google that. I dare you. You won’t find much.
Before I initiate, a few caveats:
- As I write this sentence, my husband and I include not decided what we’d like our children to call us. Nevertheless, I’m going to do my best to lay out the options we possess. Hopefully we can show up to a consensus (comment below) or at the very least make individual decisions we’re each satisfied with.
- This conversation can be an uncomfortable one. I’ve received a few messages from friends and family since raising this topic, all highlighting the rude reality of gay parenting. For example, the role that the word “Dad” plays in Western culture. Whether we (the homosexual community) like it or not, teachers will seek our children “what does your Dad do for a living” and our children will have to jump through an additional hurdle (not a complex one if you settle them down and own a rational conversation with them) to answer it. Which forces the question: is any choice other than Dad “less than” in compari
How to Talk to Your Kids About Same-Sex Marriage & Gay Parents
We communicate a lot about marriage equality in our dwelling — I feel an obligation as a parent to expose your kids to a variety of lifestyles. We are not a particularly political family, but it’s a question that comes up every once in a while. Apparently kids are prone to talking politics on the playground these days. Imagine that? I can’t be certain, but I’m fairly sure that I spent a lot of hour discussing scratch and sniff stickers and Strawberry Shortcake at recess when I was kid.
Every once in a while, one of my kids comes home with a story about how someone’s parent said that a girl can’t marry a girl. This, of course, causes my children to reevaluate what I coach them: “You love who you love and love is all you need.” So we talk about what it means to be a family and why everyone should be competent to marry the person they love.
Early elementary school-age kids are, of course, trying to make feeling of the world around them. Some might be trying to figure out whether it’s okay to marry a best partner. Others might wonder who they will want to marry. Some might grasp a child with two moms or two dads and have quest